Featured Touring 15 Days, 11 States, & 3,660 Miles: Sturgis And A Wedding

I know a number of you are currently facing a long, bleak streak of winter (@Wessa, @Iceman, @Mrs Visor & @RevPaul, I'm talking to you!). And I promised that I'd bring a bit of sunshine and vicarious riding your way with a thread about our 2024 Sturgis road trip which included a family wedding. Albeit a "bit" late, here goes!

Our first major destination for this particular trip was to attend my nephew, Jake's, wedding in southern Minnesota. When Jake and Carla announced their wedding and the date, Steve's and my first inclination was to make airline reservations. But then Steve suggested we ride there and I (of course!) agreed wholeheartedly. Any excuse to ride, right?

Here's our outbound route from Arizona to Minnesota. As you can see, we took the shortest route we could other than riding on freeways (ugh). In this case, "short" was a relative term as the route was over 1,500 miles. The ride to our Minnesota destination took us through 9 the 11 states entered on this trip--many of which I'm fine with never riding through again.



Here's our return route. But we'll get to that part of our trip down the road a bit....




Day 1: Tucson to Quemado, New Mexico *293 miles

This morning our adventure began with five people and four bikes in our group. Russell, our "main man" travel buddy, had agreed to join us on this entire journey and was looking forward to meeting my Minnesota family and seeing where I'd grown up. We were joined by Chris & Cassie, a lovely couple who we became friends with when Chris was working at our local Harley dealership. They were riding two up and planned to stay and spend the night in Show Low, AZ then ride back home the following day.

Steve's and my touring bikes all loaded up and ready to roll. I added an additional rack and small-ish bag to my setup since I was bringing a dress, heels, and other "wedding attire" along this time, something I've never traveled with on the bike before.



Our route for Day #1 and #2. We stopped the first night in Quemado and then traveled from Quemado NM to Tucumcari NM on Day #2.



We always love to stop at this rest stop at the top of where you come out of the Salt River Canyon. I've posted about this beautiful canyon previously and I love it. It's like a mini Grand Canyon. I always lobby hard to make a quick stop here to take in the views.



A selfie of our first day "gang" taken by Cassie From left to right: Cassie, Russell, Chris, me, and Steve



From the Salt River Canyon we rode on to the town of Show Low, Arizona which is in the White Mountains. Our lunch stop destination was a place we've only come to know in the past couple of years but it's now a staple on our restaurant list if we're riding through or staying in Show Low.



From here to Quemado it was just Russell, Steve, and me. Cassie and Chris had rented a cabin for the night. What was adventurous about this next section of Day #1 was that IT RAINED LIKE CATS AND DOGS THE ENTIRE WAY! Yep, desert Arizona was not feeling like a desert on this day. And, ironically enough, it was the ONLY rain we had for the entire 15 days! (Thankfully.....) Even with rain gear on, by the time we arrived in the tiny town of Quemado at The Largo Motel, the three of us were pretty soggy. But at least we didn't get hailed on while we were riding--it started hailing like crazy about five minutes after we arrived and were checking in with our favorite hotel proprieties, Phyllis. We just missed it!!

After the rain (and hail) stopped and with some clean-up elbow grease



Phyllis and one of her cats.....



Our dinner spot for the evening which was a pretty big step down from The House, I have to say.



Tomorrow, Day #2 to Tucumcari, New Mexico!

 

Day #2: Quemado, New Mexico to Tucumcari, New Mexico: 330 miles (623 miles to date)

We awoke this morning to cool temperatures and low clouds so dressed ourselves pretty warmly. The first part of today's route is one of my favorites--between Quemado and the little town of Mountainaire is gorgeous with big New Mexican skies dotted with huge clouds overhead. We ride through little tiny towns such as Magdalena and stop for gas in the dusty town of Socorro which lies on Interstate 25.

During that gas stop we met Duke and his owner! They were heading to Wyoming to meet up with some friends and from their head over to the Black Hills for the Sturgis rally. Check out Duke's bed on the gas tank! And we were pretty stunned to see that this guy didn't even have a windshield on his bike! That's Russell's bike in the background.

BTW, we met the most interesting people during our travels on this trip! Stay tuned to meet more characters.....





We always make a stop in the little town of Mountainaire at a place called Alpine Alley. We gotten to know the owner, Faye, a delightful young woman who owns the restaurant with her husband. This time we got to meet their 11-year-old daughter, too, who helps out Mom when she's not at school.

Faye was working in the kitchen on this day since the cook was out.





Next stop--Tucumcari, New Mexico! Tucumcari is right on old Route 66 and sits between "new" Route 66 which is (rather boring old) Interstate 40. None of us had been to Tucumcari before this trip so were quite curious to see the place. Steve and I had made reservations at The Blue Swallow Motel, one of the original and oldest "motor court" hotels along Route 66. It was a delightful place with lots of period correct decor and touches. We even had a garage right next to our room in which to park our bikes!





Our garage was pretty basic but as I wandered around the property I noticed that all of the other garages were painted with unique and fun motifs. Here's just one of them......



Robert, 1/2 of the delightful proprietor couple that own The Blue Swallow. They are originally from Chicago and have embraced small town life on Route 66.





The town takes full advantage of being on old Route 66. In fact, I suspect that is its prime source of revenue and why it's still around.



More Day #2 Tucumcari in my next post

 

A few more photos from Tucumcari

I meant to post this in my previous post. Here's Day #2's route from Quemado to Tucumcari.



I knew this Route 66 monument was located on our way into town. Steve missed seeing it so I insisted we ride back for this photo op.



A few random photos of Tucumcari from our wanderings

Dinner at Del's the evening of our stay. I had a fabulous green chili cheeseburger. And, as if that wasn't enough, some fried ice cream for dessert. A girl gets hungry riding all day!











Our breakfast joint before hitting the road on Day #3: Kix on 66.





Tomorrow - Day #3 from Tucumcari to Dodge City, Kansas where we met another one of those characters I mentioned!

 

Thanks, Joe! For this trip, the best is yet to come.

 

Day #3: Tucumcari, New Mexico to Dodge City, Kansas 309 miles (Trip total to date=932)

After a fine breakfast at "Kix on 66" in Tucumcari, we set off for parts unknown. None of the three of us had ever been through or to Kansas so we were eager to add another state to our list of "states we've ridden in".



Very shortly after departing we ran into the first road work stop--the first of quite a few on this trip. This one, however, was the longest wait we encountered. We were delayed by about 45 minutes. Fortunately it wasn't very hot. Check out the line of traffic (mostly big rig trucks) behind us. The good news was that we were first in line--which I guess means that the bad news is that if we'd arrived a bit earlier we'd have missed the delay!



We were eager to see Dodge City because as kids we all watched the TV show, "Gunsmoke." For those of you unfamiliar with that show, it was an American radio and television Western drama series that centered on Dodge City, Kansas, in the 1870s, during the settlement of the American West. It starred James Arness as Sheriff Matt Dillon and Dennis Weaver as Chester. In doing a bit of research, I learned that Gunsmoke originally ran as Gun Law in the UK.

A bit about Dodge City from our friend, Wikipedia. I found the part about motorcycle racing particularly interesting! And Ray Weishar's piglet, the racing mascot ,was named Johnnie, the "Fast Johnnie" that my 2023 Harley-Davidson Low Rider ST special edition model is named after.



I found Kansas to be a very pretty state--at least in the areas through which we rode. Lots of fields of grain, much of it wheat, and also a fair amount of pastureland and cattle. The part of today's ride that I did NOT enjoy was riding through the panhandles of Texas and Oklahoma. Those areas were filled with enormous cattle feedlots on which hundreds upon hundreds (probably thousands of cattle were penned, all nearly on top of one another. The smell was quite unpleasant (a nice way to put it) but seeing those cattle stacked up turned my stomach. It has definitely changed my thoughts about eating beef. When I saw the cattle in Kansas in nice, green, open pastures, my thought was--maybe I'll just eat grass fed beef from now on. Russell chided me, saying that they all wind up dead on your plate so who cares what their life was like. I answered back that we all die, too, but do we want a sh*tty life on our way to the grave??

After checking into our hotel, we moseyed on over to Boot Hill to go to the Kansas City's Boot Hill Museum which was only about a block away from where we were staying. Boot hill is a generic name for a cemetery in the West "back in the day".



This statue is Bat Masterson, a Kansas lawman and Wild West hero, "hard at work" playing poker.



This area is in between two parts of the museum. I got this photo from the Boot Hill Museum's web site. We didn't get a chance to see the gunfight reenactment during our stay but we loved the museum. This photo is from the museum's website.



If any of you get a chance to visit Kansas City, this is a must see! Here are just a few of the many photos I took.









Day #3: Dodge City, Kansas continued in my next post...

 

Day #3 continued: Dodge City, Kansas

A couple more photos from the museum...





This train was known as The Boot Hill Special. It was cool that we could go up inside.








All that exploring plus the day's ride had us working up an appetite. Next stop, the "Cowboy Capitol Restaurant" for some grub.





My delicious BBQ ribs and fixin's. That is NOT my Miller Lite beer, I'll have you know (Steve's). I had a delicious and local IPA.



Perhaps the main highlight of our time in Dodge City was getting to meet "The Last Marshall of Dodge City" while we had breakfast in our hotel. Meet Charlie Mead.



Yes, he was the actual last marshall of Dodge City. He also got to know and became friends with many of the cast from Gunsmoke. Charlie was delightful and we spent some time chatting with him. He now considers himself one of Kansas City's historians and he shared some wonderful stories with us. We didn't ask his age but from some of the times and events he shared with us, we estimate that Charlie is in his early 90's. Yep, we meet the most interesting folks on motorcycle trips!



Stay tuned, pardner! Tomorrow we head to Lincoln, Nebraska.

 

@Iron, I drool over all of your builds and bikes that you've posted about. But I have to confess, my ol' body certainly couldn't do the kind of miles you're talking about on one of your cool choppers. Trips like these are why I have a big-are touring bike in the garage!

 

Thanks, @Wessa. Glad you're enjoying our tour so far. I'm at work all day today so probably won't get a chance to continue the story. But starting tomorrow I have a four day weekend so will pick it up where I left off--heading to Lincoln, Nebraska in "The Heartland" continuing on our way to Minnesota nephew's wedding.

 

Thanks, @Heretic. Glad you're enjoying the ride report. Lots more fun to come! I hope you can get out on the road and do some trips soon!

Here's a famous photo of H-D racer, Ray Weishaar, with his piglet mascot, Fast Johnnie.

 

I think I have my dad's genes at least partially to thank for being able to stay slim. Particularly as I get older, I do try to balance out meals like that green chili cheeseburger and fried ice cream with lighter, healthier meals....a bit trickier to do while on the road on the bikes, though, I must say.

Glad you're enjoying my ride report. I just logged into the forum to continue my report with a report on our day from Dodge City, Kansas to Lincoln, Nebraska. Yep, still sunny blue skies!

 

Day #4: Dodge City, Kansas to Lincoln, Nebraska --- 392 miles
• Trip total to date = 1,324 miles

Well, this Google Map pretty much tells it all when it comes to what today's ride through American's "Heartland" was like. Not exactly a twisty-lovers paradise! We had more turns once we got into Lincoln than we had on the nearly 400 mile ride. And the route was nearly as flat as it was straight...if you can imagine that! It was also our longest mileage day to date. I was particularly glad today for my Sena comm device and my "Motorcycle Playlist".



I'm not sure where Kansas left on and Nebraska began on route 283 but it was somewhere in between Dodge City and where we got onto Interstate 80. We did encounter some slightly rolling hills (though still stick straight roads) At one point between Hill City and Norton we actually made a left turn, rode about a half a mile, then made a right turn. It broke up 283 quite nicely. Ok, I do have to admit that this road, though not the most interesting as roads go, did make its way though some very pretty farm and pastureland and a number of quaint small towns. It made for quite peaceful and relaxing riding, and the miles just went sliding by.

We'd gassed up in Dodge City and all three of us have 6 gallon gas tanks. So we had enough gas to easily do half the route before needing to stop--for the bikes, that is. We typically stop about every 120-140 miles or so for a stretch break, a pee break, and to till up both the bikes' tanks and ours. This gas station was just as we approached Interstate 80 and the end of the road--for us anyway--of route 283.

Steve and I are always on the lookout for dinosaurs and, once you start looking for them, you'd be surprised how many are lurking about! The ol' green Sinclair Gas Station dinos are usually a sure thing. This one was pretty cute but the sign indicated that some folks may have found him too cute!





As we were gassing up we discussed trying to find a place for lunch. The route we were just on had lots of wide open spaces but few places with a decent looking restaurant. There happened to be a place just past the Sinclair station so we took our chances and pulled up outside the place. We could literally see Interstate 80 from the parking lot so we figured we'd take our chances with Kirk's and not have to hope we'd find something off the interstate once we got on that. That turned out to be a wise choice because about half of the miles we covered on Interstate 80 were under construction with lots of small "detours".



Kirks was the beginning of multiple days of "midwestern food". Check out this link to see the online menu for Kirks to get an idea of what that means. It's what I grew up on...and left behind when I moved to the West (first California then Arizona).

https://order.toasttab.com/online/kirks-nebraskaland-restaurant-3002-plum-creek-pkwy

We made one more gas stop before we arrived in Lincoln--a big truck stop type place very common along U.S. interstate highways. I got to meet Charlie and his young owner, who graciously let me pet her beautiful boy. I had horses growing up and I drove a horse & carriage in San Diego for six years. And I so miss having horses. But there's one thing I'd have to do before owning a horse again. Win the lottery.



As Harley owners, it's sort of a given that you search out and stop at Harley-Davidson dealerships when traveling. And dealer log tee-shirts are always a good souvenir. Frontier Harley-Davidson, the dealership in Lincoln, is at the west edge of town on the way into the city and an easy-peasy detour off Interstate 80.

The first three bikes on the right are our motorcycles.



The dealership is very large and quite impressive.



I'm thinking the owner must be a hunter. Or simply like to hang animal heads in his dealership.






The staff were very welcoming and inquired as to where we were coming from. I bought my obligatory tee-shirt after thoroughly checking out each department--motorcycles, parts, and motor clothes. When I mentioned to the clerk what a nice dealership this was, he told me that, although Frontier Harley has been around for a long, long time, the building itself was only four years old. The previous building was destroyed in a tornado! THAT'S the kind of weather I was a bit worried about for our route to Minnesota since there are a lot of tornados in this part of the country and at this time of the year. And I HATE tornados. One hit my childhood home and town, and it nearly killed my father.

We stayed at a chain hotel this evening (a Best Western if I remember correctly) right off the interstate. We'd hoped to get downtown to look around but it had been a long day in the saddle and we didn't want to get back in the saddle after showering up. We we checked out what dinner places were within walking distance and found ourselves at another chain, Cracker Barrel. Steve and I have been to the Cracker Barrel in Tucson a number of times but Russel had never been to any Crack Barrel. I always enjoy it but Russel said he was "one and done".



Lincoln is the home of the University of Nebraska "Cornhuskers". I'm a pretty big football fan so have known about the Cornhuskers as they're typically in the thick of good college ball. But now that I've ridden through miles upon miles of corn fields, I can truly appreciate the rational for the name of the team!

Internet photo


So today wasn't exactly the most interesting day we've had on a motorcycle trip. Nonetheless we had a wonderful day. And, you know what they say, "The worst day on a motorcycle is better than the best day"!

Tomorrow, onward to southern Minnesota for the big wedding! We'll ride through three states tomorrow--Nebraska, Iowa, and Minnesota. Stay tuned!